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The owners of Rancho Guejito, the historic Mexican land grant
and unspoiled territory east of Escondido, are suing San Diego
County over a new land-use plan the owners say "severely injures"
their financial future.

Rancho Guejito is a vast 23,000-acre property studded with oak
trees, sloping valleys, American Indian artifacts and abundant
wildlife. The property, with its working cattle ranch and citrus
groves, is considered San Diego County's next battleground between
development and conservation.

Its owner, Rancho Guejito Corp. of Escondido, filed the lawsuit
Sept. 2, one month after the county approved its General Plan
Update, a plan that sharply reduces the number of future homes
allowed outside city limits, including at the Rancho.

Hank Rupp, Rancho Guejito Corp.'s chief operating officer, said
the lawsuit won't stop the corporation from working on a possible
development plan.

The company surveyed residents earlier this year about whether
they would support a project of up to 10,000 homes on the property,
stoking long-held beliefs of a coming battle between those who want
the property to remain pristine and those who support growth on the
land.

"There's no formal application for development in front of the
county at this point," Rupp said by phone Friday. "However, we
continue to gather information regarding that potential. .... We
continue to gather information on the highest and best use of our
property."

Rupp declined to specify what that "highest and best" use might
be.

One prominent environmentalist said Friday that the
corporation's lawsuit appears designed to "leverage" exemptions
from the county for the small city of homes it's shown interest in
building on the sprawling rural property.

"Unless they want something as a result of this lawsuit to
leverage a shift (in zoning) to a major urban use, then I don't
really know what they're trying to get at," said Dan Silver,
executive director of the Los Angeles-based Endangered Habitats
League.

Rupp dismissed the idea the corporation was trying to leverage
anything, saying Silver was "purely speculating." He repeated
Friday that Rancho Guejito "is not for sale."

Silver has worked alongside county leaders, including North
County Supervisor Bill Horn, to raise taxpayer money to purchase
and preserve Rancho Guejito.

In a statement on Friday, Horn said he has tried in years past
to "find an arrangement to achieve a conservation easement" on
Rancho Guejito, but its owners are not interested.

Rupp said the county never presented a formal offer to buy
Rancho Guejito

Rupp outlined a proposal to county planners in September 2009
that would permanently preserve the land grant on the northern part
of the property but allow for development of roughly 10,000 homes
on acreage to the south, according to a copy of a letter county
planning chief Eric Gibson sent to Rupp after that meeting.

Rancho Guejito representatives also held a public meeting with
Highway 76 area residents in February 2010. They detailed
conservation plans but did not specify the corporation's
development intentions.

Neither the recently approved General Plan Update nor the
previous planning document would allow Rancho Guejito to build
thousands of homes; a major exemption would be required by the
county's Board of Supervisors for such a large-scale
development.